OUR VIEW: Marijuana could aid medical treatments

The war on drugs continues in the United States, although in Colorado, for example, one significant battle has been yielded. Marijuana is sold legally there, and not just for medical reasons.

While we do not agree with legalization of marijuana for recreational use, we are watching with interest proposed legislation that would make the use of medicinal marijuana legal in Tennessee.

The Koozer-Kuhn bill currently being considered in the state Legislature was named for the Koozers, a family who moved from Knoxville to Colorado, so they could use cannabis as part of their daughter's treatment for seizures. The Kuhn part of the name refers to the late Jeanne Kuhn, who used medical marijuana to ease the side effects of chemotherapy she underwent for breast cancer.

And the Koozer-Kuhn Medical Cannabis Act would legalize the use of marijuana to treat only specific medical conditions. A recent poll conducted by Middle Tennessee State University shows that a majority of Tennesseans favor legalizing marijuana for medicinal use.

When you consider some of the drugs that are already legally prescribed, highly addictive pain killers, for example, one has to wonder why marijuana should be in a too-dangerous-to-prescribe category.

Rep. Sherry Jones, a Nashville Democrat, wrote the Koozer-Kuhn bill after watching her brother die from Crohn's Disease.

"My brother was basically tortured the last eight months of his life because of his disease," Jones told Daily News Journal news partner WSMV. "Nobody deserves that. And if a few drops of medical marijuana under your tongue, or a patch, or a lotion or some butter will make a difference to people's quality of life, we should do this."

She admits she has more than a few of her fellow lawmakers left to convince.

"They think it's all blowing smoke in babies' faces, I guess," she is quoted as saying. "They don't understand there are other ways to use marijuana, like tinctures and lotions."

But she has seen some support from the more libertarian-minded lawmakers who "believe it's not fair to keep these sorts of remedies from people who need them."

We couldn't agree more.

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OUR VIEW: Marijuana could aid medical treatments

The war on drugs continues in the United States, although in Colorado, for example, one significant battle has been yielded. Marijuana is sold legally there, and not just for medical reasons.